Sklounion

In trawling through "Finnish Modern Design" edited by Aav and Striztler-Levine, I was aware that Wirkkala had designed stuff for Italian companies. On page 303, there is a vase, and working drawings for very Italian looking vases for Iittala, dating to 1955. Very similar in fact to work by da Ros for Cenedese.

Wirkkala worked for Venini from 1966, I think he was even artistic director ad interim for a while. Sarpaneva worked for Venini from 1988. Tyra Lundgren worked for Venini in 1937 and after 1948. It seems there has always been a very close relationship between Finnish and Italian glass design - much more than between Italian and Swedish, for instance. I've read somewhere it is due to the Italian appreciation for the understated, and the Finnish appreciation of the boldly overstated... :lol:

Small but beautifully formed unlike my good self.Over the years Venini have always been very progressive in using foreign designers and in addition to the Scandinavian ingluences have also used a number of American designers with some superb results.Paul

Sklounion

There is an image of one of these vases, in the flesh, with production number. Vase in sommerso, purple/amethyst over blue. Drawings show vases red over blue and yellow/ the reverse order, and a vase with colour inclusion to the base, and both vase no 2892-340 and the drawings are for cylindrical vases.

Wirkkala worked for Venini from 1966, I think he was even artistic director ad interim for a while.

Just spotted that the Venini site has an image of the Wirkkala designs for Venini... it's a Flash site so I can't post a direct link to the individual page but it's on http://www.venini.com/venini.html under the History link... click NEXT on the images until you reach 1970 and the BOLLE incalmo bottles by Wirkkala.

BTW if anyone's not found it yet, there is a free CD-ROM available from the same site (see under Media & Communication > Media > Venini Arte Pura.) I asked for one some time ago and it arrived within a week. It has films showing all the different techniques in use at Venini. Well worth having.

This website is very useful to a point, Venini only but has info and pics on Tyra Lundgren, Thomas Stearns, Tapio Wirkkala, Dale Chihuly, Richard Marquis, Toots Zynski - so Scandinavian and American designers have always had a link to Murano's major prestige glass manufacturer